Cult-like
by S.Capriati
Summary: Clarke just wanted time to figure out if she could live with the person she had become. Instead, things are about to get bizarre, sexy and a little bit interesting when Clarke is abducted and taken to a strange settlement far, far away. Armed with nothing but her wits, Clarke has a whole new set of villains to defeat and obstacles to overcome. Luckily, she won't be alone.


**CHAPTER ONE |** Point Breakdown

* * *

 _It was stupid. She had been so stupid._

 _A branch whipped across Clarke's cheek causing a breathy chirp of pain to escape her throat. She felt moisture on her face, but blood or tears, perhaps even both, she didn't have time to wipe it away._

 _The terrain grew increasingly rocky with big boulders shaping the forested slopes ahead. She took a sharp left and began bounding from stone to stone. She hoped the hard surface would disguise her trail, making her more difficult to track._

 _She flicked her head to the side as sweat slicked flyaways danced across her field of vision. Her scalp ached near the apex of her parietal bone, a tell-tale sign of hair that's been in a ponytail for too long. She took a moment to marvel at the fact that she found this gnawing soreness more uncomfortable than the physical exertion of sprinting uphill._

 _ **BOOM-BOOM-BOOM.**_ _Leap._ _ **BOOM-BOOM-BOOM.**_ _Leap. Her stride fell into contentious rhythm with the frenetic beat of her heart._

 _No longer was she the isolated, vitamin D deficient prisoner destined for death by celestial exposure. And it was impossible for her to accept that she'd ever been the idealistic young medical apprentice with a bright future in a world that was never meant to be and would never come to be..._

 _Clarke Griffin was feral; she was hunted prey on a flight path._

* * *

Clarke spent the first day of her self-imposed sentence dragging her feet along a windy trajectory as she slowly put distance between herself and her people.

The boisterous chatter and lively faces of her companions was a sight Clarke could only enjoy from beyond the perimeter of Camp Jaha. The compound had been built for survivors and the immeasurable weight she now carried marked her as something else entirely.

She took out her uneasy energy on any foliage that made the mistake of existing within her wingspan, while her thoughts oscillated between the seemingly insurmountable feat she had just accomplished and the incredible price she had agreed to pay for it.

Recognizing that she hadn't been alone in her success did nothing to soothe the guilt; it was her single-minded recklessness and leadership that had ultimately paved the way for their safe return to Camp Jaha and assigning herself sole-culpability, ironically, was the only thing keeping her from crumbling in its wake. To add insult, she couldn't quell the pride that seeped out of her in shameful, torturous waves at the knowledge that she had overcome every single obstacle that had presented itself. She DID it. She had _actually_ succeeded in bringing them home.

Clarke was several hours into her hike when the forest began to feel familiar. However, it wasn't until she was kneeling over the hidden hatch, brushing away dead leaves to reveal its metal surface, that she realized she'd been making her way towards the bunker for quite some time.

The hinges whined as she pulled the hatch open. She shed her jacket and gun and carefully lowered them in before making her way down through the narrow opening and into the shadowy confines of the shelter.

The stale, dry air wrapped around her in a gentle embrace, although, she immediately regretted removing her jacket, the frigid subterranean temperature made quick work of absorbing any warmth she had accumulated on her trek.

Clarke squinted into the opaque depths of the bunker and waited for her eyes to adjust. It was incredibly dark. The overcast sky and heavy tree coverage lent so little light into the open hatch that only the ladder was softly lit.

She inched forward blindly, exploring the floor with the toe of her right boot so as not to trip over anything. After a few steps she extended her arm out to where a shelf should be and searched for a matchbox and candle she vaguely recalled leaving there.

It crossed her mind that the bunker was in all likelihood stripped; its use as a romantic rendezvous had been entirely fleeting, perhaps, Clarke mused, because romantic rendezvous had no place in this world.

"Oh Finn," she sighed with a sad smile. His name echoed softly against the concrete walls. She took a moment to reminisce on their short lived romance and to her relief was filled, not with pain or regret, but with bittersweetness. All the anger she had felt towards him was absent, it had bled out in warm merciful gushes when she'd spared him the wrath of Lexa's clan.

Her foot hit something solid just as her outstretched fingers dragged over the cardboard lid of a matchbox. She carefully ferreted out a single match, but before she could run it along the matchbox's rough side, her hand froze as a new smell begged her attention. It cut through the dry air, subtly sweet in a way that was wholly unpleasant and unfortunately, at this point, hardly unfamiliar.

Clarke's hand shook as she struck the match a few time. Her pupils jerked reflexively as the match finally found enough friction to ignite.

She had a moment to brace herself, but the body that lay before her in a puddle of dried blood was the drop that filled the bucket.

Instead of the partially mummified corpse before her, Clarke saw the tastefully decorated hall with its vaulted ceilings and priceless artifacts. She saw the defenseless people, children among them, that she had condemned to a sure and painful death. They littered the ground, pocked with radiation, their expressions twisted in pain. Just like this man, they remained where they had fallen, in glaring tribute to their death.

The match burned out and darkness swiftly reclaimed the bunker; it surrounded Clarke so thickly that she started to feel pangs of claustrophobia laced with vertigo. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end and she violently shuddered as overwhelming panic set it. Pain cut through her larynx as she screamed.

She clumsily turned and promptly tripped over her boot. Her fingertips brushed against the cold concrete floor as she caught herself. She wobbled on unsteady feet back to the base of the ladder, clutching it as her legs threatened to give out. The palms of her hands were drenched in cold sweat and she slipped on her first attempt to scale the ladder, landing heavily on her hip.

Clarke looked over her shoulder and whimpered as the impenetrable darkness seemed to surge towards her menacingly. Her eyes snapped shut and she hugged the base of the ladder as silent sobs racked her body. Trembling, she slowly sat up on her knees, wiped her hands against her pants, and once more attempted to scale the ladder.

Her nose began picking up on hints of fresh air once she had made it about ¾ of the way up, but before she could enjoy any sense of relief, her right hand slipped while her right foot was reaching for the next rung. Her eyes shot open as the momentum threw her right shoulder back and she frantically swiped her foot forward in an attempt to regain her footing.

A strangled cry escaped her lips; she was going to fall. She inhaled a sharp breath and shut her eyes as she resigned herself to a painful drop back into the nightmare below.

A vice-like grip descended upon her shoulder and jerked her forward into the ladder. She managed to turn her head in time to avoid knocking into one of the rungs and instead caught the cold metal against the soft give of her cheek.

Turned as she was, her nose brushed along the soft underside of the arm gripping her shoulder. She was suddenly treated to a smell that was musky, subtly sweet and hardly unfamiliar, but this time, in a way that was wholly pleasant and wonderfully welcome and Clarke couldn't help but nuzzle into it.

* * *

 **[A/N]** Excuse the setup! I was going to skip it because I think Clarke's departure from Camp Jaha has been pretty well covered by others already, but I had already written a bunch and just decided to stick to my outline.

Also, I'm really unsure and inconsistent with my comma usage. I hope it doesn't drive you crazy, unless you are a horrible person, in which case-MUAHAHAHAH!

Thanks for reading and have a really good day!


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